Hilfenhaus must get back in the swing

Brendan McArdle

Published: November 9 2012 - 3:00AM

GIVEN the current injuries to Pat Cummins and Shane Watson, and the confusion surrounding what constitutes too much or too little cricket, Cricket Australia might need to keep its fingers crossed about one of its other bowlers over the next few weeks.

Ben Hilfenhaus has played just one first-class match since the West Indies tour in April and is considerably underdone for Friday's first Test. While workload and preparation are surely among the most contentious issues in sport, his build-up for the Australian summer seems horribly wrong.

A little over two weeks ago Hilfenhaus was playing for Chennai in the Champions League. On the Saturday night Chennai lost to Mumbai and with it the chance to qualify for the semi-finals. Hilfenhaus should have been flown home immediately to play a Sheffield Shield match against Victoria that week, yet was allowed to stay on and play Chennai's last match two days later, a dead-rubber so irrelevant that M.S. Dhoni handed over the captaincy and the keeping gloves and trundled down two overs.

Hilfenhaus thrives on hard work and it was generally agreed that his impressive comeback against the Indians last summer was based on some prolonged four-day cricket for Tasmania. By this time last year he was into his third shield match of the season and he played another two before being recalled to the Australian attack on Boxing Day.

It can easily be forgotten that Hilfenhaus was almost on the cricket scrap heap 12 months ago. He appeared to have lost a metre of pace and was swinging the ball too predictably. He played no part in Australia's impressive tours of Sri Lanka and South Africa.

Yet his performances against the Indians - 27 wickets at 17 runs - were a credit to both his own resilience and the support he received from Tasmanian bowling coach Ali de Winter and captain George Bailey. Along with Peter Siddle, he destroyed the world's most glamorous batting line-up. He then toiled manfully in the West Indies and even scored a series-defining half-century.

Once regarded as not particularly suited to Twenty20 cricket, he followed up with a successful Indian Premier League campaign for Chennai in May. Maybe his priorities changed, maybe the incessant travel and preparation involved for cricketers who play all three forms of the game took its toll, but he then bowled unimpressively in Australia's one-day series with England in July.

It will be disappointing if his exploits of last summer now become a distant memory. He's the one member of our pace contingent who has flown under the radar: Siddle and James Pattinson have had their measured build-ups on the shield circuit, Mitchell Starc has generated excitement with his Twenty20 performances and the Cummins tale has been well documented.

Last week Hilfenhaus had the unflattering experience of taking 1-74 and making a duck in his first game back in coloured clothes for his state. He then took two wickets against lowly South Australia in seam-friendly conditions at Bellerive before bowling 26 overs in the second innings.

The balance between too much cricket and not enough is a delicate one.

Let's hope Hilfenhaus re-discovers last season's mojo and again proves himself Australia's best swing bowler, otherwise questions are entitled to be asked. The fact Starc has been favoured ahead of him in some circles says as much about Hilfenhaus' preparation as it does about the huge potential of the New South Wales left-armer.

This story was found at: http://www.theage.com.au/sport/cricket/hilfenhaus-must-get-back-in-the-swing-20121108-290wd.html